Do you ever do something in your business and think: "This is it. This is the thing that's going to change everything!"?

The course launch that will sell out in a day.

The Reel that will go viral and catapult you to Insta stardom.

The blog that will be spotted and lead to a book deal.

The podcast appearance that will open the newsletter subscriber floodgates.

I'm not ashamed to say I have done this, and still do sometimes (I have a great imagination).

It’s not that these things can’t happen. Of course they are possible. We’ve all seen it happen to people (usually because they tell us about it on social media!).

But you know who shares those kinds of success stories? The tiny fraction of people for whom it happened like that. (And I’m sorry to be a cynic, but more often than not they are telling us because they are selling something related to that success.)

Good for them! But let's not normalise these stories. Let's be clear that you can easily follow exactly the same steps to success that they did, and not have the same outcome. Your outcome may be completely different.

Instead, why not focusing on a more realistic and sustainable of growing: one by one.

Find one client and treat them really well. Then the next one will come, and the next.

Find one subscriber or follower, give them really great, valuable content. The rest will come, one by one by one.

Do not be fooled into thinking that unless your audience growth is stratospheric, you're not doing it right. Keep shuffling: baby steps still move your forward.

A version of this post appeared in one of my weekly email newsletters earlier this year. If you liked reading it, please subscribe!